How to Choose Mix-and-Match Fabrics for a Doll’s Wardrobe @ ChellyWood.com #DollClothes #Fabrics

"Doll Wardrobe" is the heading for this photo. It's a picture of the Chelly Wood doll (actually a Spin Master Liv doll) standing beside a long string of doll clothes, which include (left to right), a maroon-colored floral long skirt, a pink blouse with short raglan sleeves, a maroon tank top, a pink "jumper" (American sense of the word "jumper"), and a maroon-pink-white multicolored short skirt. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

I had so much fun this weekend!

Yesterday’s blog post gave you a bit of a preview, but here’s what happened in greater detail.

A lot of people don’t know this, but I’m lactose intolerant. That means I can’t drink cows’ milk. (Don’t worry; I’m going to get to the fabric part! I promise!)

However I can drink goats’ milk. And last spring a local family gave me several gallons of fresh goats’ milk, which I pasteurized, froze, and was able to eat/drink over the course of several months.

It was a very kind gesture, on the part of the Lancaster family.

So when I found out that they have a four-year-old daughter, I was determined to make her a small wardrobe of doll clothes for her Barbies. Kind gestures deserve kindness in return!

How did I choose my fabrics so the whole ensemble would mix-and-match well? That’s what this blog post is all about…

I started with the most colorful of the fabrics. Can you tell what colors appear in this print? Try to name them:

The photo is a close-up of a fabric that has swirling floral and leafy stylized images. The colors seen in the leaves, buds, berries, and other fauna include a reddish orange, a very obvious white swirl, a pink swirl, a maroon (almost rust color), a peachy-pink or salmon color, and a wine color. The background color is maroon. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

Then I went to the drawer where I kept my fabrics, and I searched for colors that would match this multi-colored fabric.

I lay them together in piles, and then in pairs, trying to decide if any of the colors are not compatible with the pallet.

Take a look at the pairings of fabrics in this collage. Which color seems to contrast too much?

This is a collage of fabrics in various prints in solids, including all of the following colors: maroon, pink, white, orange, and a burgundy wine color. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

If you said “Orange,” I would agree with you. It’s just too strong, when you pair it with the other fabrics in the selection. Have a closer look:

Here we see five different fabrics pictured: the solids are pink, wine colored, and orange. The prints include a multicolored swirling floral fabric and a maroon or wine colored floral fabric with a white background of color. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

I ended up swapping orange for white, and then later, when I’d made a few garments, I added a new fabric.

I felt like the selection had turned out too dark, and maybe a little too dreary for a little girl’s dolls. I wanted to work with the pink a bit, so I set out various swatches of colorful fabrics among the garments I’d made so far.

I ended up going with this pink fabric, which had polka dots that sort of matched the other colors I was working with:

In the background, there are two skirts. One uses the wine-colored floral fabric, and the other uses the multicolored swirl print fabric. Overlaid upon these skirts is a new fabric: pink with multicolored polka dots. Laying on top of this swatch of fabric is a pink shirt and a tank top made of the wine colored floral fabric. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

I liked this pink with multicolored polka dots, but at first, I was worried that the clothes I’d made so far were more of a wine color, while the pink fabric had more of a maroon shade to the darkest of its polka dots.

So I took the reversible tank top that I’d made and flipped it inside out, to compare that wine color with the polka dots in the pink fabric. Here’s how that looked…

Chelly Wood's hand adds a wine-colored tank top to the fabric and doll clothing ensemble. She seems to be comparing the wine color to the maroon polka dots in the pink fabric. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

The pink fabric with multicolored polka dots would be used for a dress, so it didn’t necessarily have to mix-and-match like the separates would.

The Chelly Wood doll points to a pink dress. In America, we would call this type of dress (that's sort of strappy at the shoulders and is intended to go over the top of a blouse) a "jumper," but in the UK they don't say "jumper" for this type of dress. The dress, which is very straight (not flared or A-line at all) is pink with tiny multi-colored polka dots. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

But in the end, I really liked the color pallet of the whole wardrobe. I think the little girl who receives this gift will be able to mix and match her outfits nicely, with few issues.

When you’re making a doll’s wardrobe, how do you choose your fabrics? Leave comments, so we can all learn from each other!